Page 104 - ISES SWC50

Nobel Mezri
Country: France
Year Started Research: 1975
Title of Research: The solar heating and cooling applied to building and
industry
University: University of Lyon (France) at the Institute of National
Applied Sciences (INSA).
Still Active in Research: Yes

Nobel Mezri studied at the department of concrete, structures and thermal buildings part ofcivil engineering section
of the National Institute of Applied Sciences (INSA) (University of Lyon, France). There, the topic of solar thermal
research had been invented and proposed by Mezri in his thesis and would become the focus of his future industrial
programmes as well as his patents. His first patent subsequently was called “Buildings shelled in structural-thermal
solar” and was obtained in 1982. His doctoral research had lasted five years (1976 - 1980) and was exclusively
self-funded, as, at this time, there were no research credits available on renewable energy. After his thesis, in 1993,
he founded, among others, his own laboratory named MEZRI THERMOSOLAIRE which allowed him to diversify
and improve his scientific and technological inventions and innovations in the field of solar and hybrid energy for
the benefit of the carbon-free industry. In 2006, the European Commission chose his work on solar thermal as a
reference programme for the building and industry sectors in Europe. With this, his research has served to initiate
the European and planetary dynamic in terms of the energy transition, clean technology and the fight against
global warming. In 2004, his patents and his carbon-free technologies allowed him to create his first solar thermal
engineering company, followed by his company MEZRI THERMOSOLAIRE INDUSTRY in 2010. Mezri has had 45
years of high-tech solar experience adding value to his fight against global warming.

David Mills ISES President 1997-99
Country: Australia
Year Started Research: 1976
Title of Research: Prism Solar Concentrators, Non-Imaging Optics,
Double Cermet Solar Absorbers, Linear Fresnel Reflector, Concentrators
University: University of NSW (UNSW), University of Sydney
Still Active in Research: No

Dr David Mills is a former ISES Vice-President (1995-97) and President (1997-99). He studied as masters and
doctoral student at UNSW School of Physics from 1976-1980 in the areas of ideal asymmetrical non-imaging
optical concentration systems such as the novel prism PV concentrator, and developed both asymmetrical and
symmetrical reflector concentrating thermal systems. After graduating in 1980, he moved to the University of
Sydney and he developed a pressurised water solar cooker design in the early 1980s. He obtained funding for
and managed the development of advanced germanium and double cermet coatings for evacuated tube systems
between and 1989 and 2004, working with Dr. Q-C Zhang. The double cermet coatings represented a very new
and much lower emissivity design that became widely used in Chinese-manufactured evacuated tubes after
2004. David also developed improved linear Fresnel reflector concentrating systems in the early 1990s with Prof.
Graham Morrison which were patented and demonstrated by the SHP and Ausra companies of which he was a
co-founder, and commercial plants were built in Australia, USA and India. David also worked with his former student
Dr Philipp Schramek and the CSIRO on advanced high density tower heliostat designs using a horizontal rotation
axis and software driven collision avoidance which were subsequently built by the CSIRO and influenced later
tower developments. After retirement in 2009, David delivered a well-attended conceptual paper co-authored by
Dr. Weili Cheng at ISES 2011 illustrating that inflexible baseload power such as produced by coal was completely
unnecessary if flexible designs like wind or solar with energy storage were available; this important flexibility
argument afterward became fully appreciated by the renewable energy industry after the paper’s graphs were
quickly reproduced in the IEA2011 Perspectives publication and by other academic authors. David received an
award from ANZSES as a Solar Pioneer in 2011 and was made a Member of the Order of Australia in 2015 for
service to Physics and Solar Energy.

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